


A Clockwork Cold

by Batrisk4044



Category: The Watchmaker of Filigree Street - Natasha Pulley
Genre: Alternate Universe - Victorian, Caretaking, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, No Plot/Plotless, Sickfic, Sneezing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:20:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21557653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Batrisk4044/pseuds/Batrisk4044
Summary: Mori catches a cold; Thaniel tries to help. Hurt/comfort fluff with absolutely no plot to speak of, I just love these characters. Set some unspecified time after Watchmaker.
Relationships: Keita Mori/Thaniel Steepleton
Comments: 1
Kudos: 55





	A Clockwork Cold

Thaniel first started suspecting something was up when he took two cups of tea into the parlour that evening, a custom that was becoming a tradition as the nights grew longer. The fire was blazing even hotter than the usual balmy temperature Mori preferred, and the small figure was sitting cross legged, reading a book, as close as was safe to the flames. Thaniel put the tea down on the low table between them, managing to avoid Katsu as he skirted around his ankles before settling in the Japanese man’s lap. Mori took a sip of the tea and placed the cup back on the saucer with a tiny, musical rattle. Another sign that all wasn’t right; usually Mori’s attention to etiquette (Thaniel couldn’t remember another time he hadn’t been thanked for doing anything in the house) and his precision in movement was second to none.

“Are you feeling well?” He asked, gently, finding the page in his own book. Mori looked up, his free hand caressing Katsu’s glinting metal back.

“Sorry?”

“It’s very warm in here, is all. And you seem a bit…distracted.”

“Oh.” Mori paused, his head cocked slightly, as though listening. “I’m getting a cold.” He tucked his hands within the sleeves of his dark blue woollen jumper and hunched over his steaming tea.

“Bad luck. I suppose it’s that time of year.” November had been cold, the weather already turning truly wintry with howling winds and freezing rain. Mori, used to the much warmer climes of Japan, ventured out less and less during any kind of English ‘weather’. “Maybe an early night would help?”

“Mmm.” Mori took another sip of tea while feeling in his waistcoat pocket for something. He pulled out a folded, dark blue handkerchief which he held loosely, his hand on his knee. Putting down the cup, he turned and twisted one of Katsu’s leg joints, the metal making a greeny-golden squeak in protest. But a moment later he pitched forward with a fiercely-stifled sneeze, handkerchief cupped over his nose and mouth.

“ _Hh’tch!!_ ” Katsu skittered off his lap in alarm and took up residence on the piano stool instead, tucking his legs underneath his body primly.

“Bless you.”

Mori rubbed his red eyes wearily. “Alright, I’ll be up shortly,” he muttered.

“Sorry?”

Mori winced as though he had a sudden headache. He kneaded his forehead. “I’m getting mixed up. You were going to say you were going to bed.”

“Oh. Well, I am. Are you—oh, I see.”

The next morning Thaniel made them both breakfast. He could hear Mori in the room above him getting ready, the creak of drawers as he dressed, punctuated by occasional coughing. When he joined Thaniel in the kitchen, he sat stiffly at the table as though holding himself straight was an effort. Thaniel put a cup of tea and some toast in front of him and Mori picked at it as Thaniel tucked into his own. His usually warm-toned skin looked washed-out in the morning light and he sniffed several times as he drank his tea.

“Are you going to open the shop today?” Thaniel asked, eventually. Mori looked at him blankly.

“Yes, of course. It’s just a cold. Don’t fuss.”

“Alright.” He quietly suspected that Mori would spend the day being tetchy with customers and frustrated with himself when he made mistakes in his work, but Thaniel didn’t push it. He didn’t need to go into the office today, and he and Mori had settled into a comfortable routine where he undertook Foreign Office translation and transcription services (from Japanese to English, and the reverse) from the workshop. It meant that either of them could mind the shop while the other took a break or made tea in the kitchen. He had grown quite adept at deciphering Mori’s ledgers and diaries to organise his work, and Mori could help with any particularly tricky grammar not covered by his dictionaries.

As Thaniel made to wash up the breakfast things, Mori rose and took them smoothly from his hands. “I’ll do those,” he said. “The post is just arriving with something for you.” As he spoke, Thaniel heard the rattle in the front door letterbox. He went to the door to collect it and found a letter from his sister. Smiling, he stood with his back to the hall wall and read through her latest report of his nephews' antics. Finished, he returned to the kitchen.

“ _Hh’shieww!_ _Hhrr’sshhieww!!”_ Mori sneezed forcefully into his handkerchief, shoulders shuddering with each spasm. He paused for a second, handkerchief still half raised, before sneezing a third time, then finally a fourth. “ _Huh’hsshieww!! Heh…Hhuh’hsshieww!!”_

“Bless you.” Thaniel sat next to him at the long oak table, laying the letter down between them on the table. He reached an arm around the smaller man’s shoulders and gave them a comforting squeeze. Mori flinched slightly, and Thaniel tensed. They hadn’t been doing…whatever this was…for more than a few months, and the line between acceptable and intrusive was still blurred and awkward at times. But then he felt Mori relax and put his hand on Thaniel’s knee below the table, the sides of their bodies warm against one another as they sat close.

“They’re doing well then, in Edinburgh.” Mori’s voice was a little thick and hoarse, the consonants muddied brown rather than their usual clear gold. He sniffed. “That’s good.”

The day passed uneventfully; Thaniel laid out his latest translation at a small table to one side of the workshop, and Mori continued yesterday’s fiddly clockwork task where he had left off, a steaming cup of green tea beside them both. Katsu trundled about the room, occasionally trying to make off with seemingly-unattended cogs and springs, but always being shooed off in the nick of time by Mori. The morning ticked away, with only a few browsing customers breaking the silence. Occasionally Thaniel heard Mori tutting to himself as he examined his work through a magnifying glass. Also growing more frequent was a repetitive pattern of movements, which Thaniel began to attend to. First, Mori would feel in his waistcoat pocket and take out his handkerchief, always folded neatly, and lay it on the table beside him. He would then continue with his work for a few seconds…

“Bless you,” Thaniel interrupted the silence. Mori looked up at him in confusion, but then his gaze grew unfocused and he picked up the handkerchief, doubling over with an insistent sneeze.

“ _Heh’hsshieww!!_ ” Sighing, he refolded the handkerchief and returned it to his pocket.

Amused by his discovery, Thaniel tested it two more times, until Mori glared at him.

“Anyone would think _you_ were the one with muddled memories. I’m starting to think you have some clairvoyant power to _make_ me sneeze.”

Thaniel chuckled. “I certainly don’t. You always take your handkerchief out of your pocket a few seconds before you sneeze.”

“Oh.” Mori tapped the pocket thoughtfully. He frowned. “I hate feeling like this. Everything gets out of order.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” Thaniel felt bad about his little joke at Mori’s expense, and stood up. “I’ll make some more tea.”

As the kettle boiled he heard Mori sneeze again, the sound carrying easily to the kitchen.

“ _Heehh’shieww!! Hehh’ **hshieww!!** ”_

“Bless you!” He called from the back room, stirring some honeycomb and lemon juice together in hot water. As he waited for his own tea to brew, the bell over the workshop door trilled a bright, hummingbird blue, and he heard a young woman’s voice.

“Excuse me, but do you repair clockwork items?” Thaniel heard the click of high heels on the wooden floorboards, and he moved to stand just to one side of the door, where he could see through a slit to the workshop. Mori had stood up.

“Yes, we do. May I see it?” The woman passed over some kind of locket on a chain. Mori examined it.

“It just stopped working a few weeks ago. I’ve tried winding it up, but it hasn’t started again.”

“It looks like a spring within the mechanism has broken and done some damage.” He heard Mori cough and saw him turn aside, holding his handkerchief to his mouth. The coughing fit went on for longer than was comfortable, and the young woman shifted awkwardly on the spot. “Excuse me,” Mori apologised, when it had subsided. “I can repair it, but I’ll need to see when I can fit in the time. It will only take an hour or so, but I have rather a lot of work at the moment.” His voice cracked, and he began to cough again. Thaniel, seeing the woman wavering, decided to intervene. He took a metal spoon and struck the side of Katsu’s tank with a loud, turquoise, note, then crossed the room and opened the door to the workshop.

“I’m terribly sorry to disturb, Mr Mori, but the reticulating splines have gone again in the back room, and I can’t get them realigned. Would you be able to take a look?” Mori had stopped coughing again, but his eyes were red, and he was leaning on the edge of the table. He nodded, as Thaniel continued, deliberately roughening the edges of his Lincolnshire accent further than normal. “And I’d be happy to book this young lady’s work into the diary while I’m here.” He smiled and she smiled back, charmed. Mori took the life rope thrown to him and ducked into the kitchen.

“Is Mr Mori alright?” she asked in a low tone, as Thaniel leafed through Mori’s Japanese diary for a suitable day.

“Oh, yes ma’am, just doesn’t get on well with English weather. Japan is much warmer, you see.” She nodded sympathetically, and he got her to sign her name on a slip to retrieve the locket in a week’s time.

Once she had left, the bell shrilling blue again, Thaniel shut the workshop door, firmly turned the sign to “CLOSED”, and switched off the electric lights. He found Mori still in the kitchen, cradling his cup of hot honey and lemon.

“I’ve closed up for the day.” Thaniel sat down next to him and reached across to hold the back of his hand to Mori’s forehead, which was hot. “Because _you_ are going straight to bed.”

Mori smiled only with his eyes. “I managed to survive plenty of colds before you arrived to interfere.” But he shivered and leaned into Thaniel’s body. “What was that nonsense back here? Reticulating splines?”

“I could see you were going to lose a paying customer, being short with that lady about not having the time to fix her locket, and generally looking like a consumptive at death’s door. I wanted to try to smooth things over.” Mori rolled his eyes but squeezed Thaniel’s hand with his smaller one.

“Alright, you win. I’m going.” He stood up from the table. As Mori passed him, Thaniel felt a hand stroke his back gently, and then the door closed behind him.


End file.
